Faculty News: February 2016 Edition
Here is a peek into this last month's remarkable activity and accomplishments of The King's College faculty. Perhaps earning the spot of highest-profile news on campus this month, was Chris Cragin-Day's play, Luther on Trial, which sold-out before this fairly competent student had the chance to book her ticket. The show will be running in Washington D.C. in early May, with plans to bring its reviewed and revised version back to New York this fall. Besides this, the associate professor of English and theatre is also participating for the third year in the New York's The One-Minute Play Festival. Finally, Cragin-Day's musical, The Unusual Tale of Mary and Joseph's Baby, will be produced this December in Knoxville, Tennessee, at their River and Rail Theatre.
Alissa Wilkinson, Assistant Professor of English and Humanities, covered the Berlin Film Festival for Christianity Today. She viewed 13 films, reviewed six, and conducted four interviews. Specifically, she reviewed The Sun of Joseph, Alone in Berlin, Zero Days, The Music of Strangers: Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, Midnight Special, and A Quiet Passion. She debuted on rogerebert.com with her interview of director Jeff Nichols and actor Michael Shannon from Midnight Special.
Dr. David Talcott, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, attended the annual meeting of the New York City Ancient Philosophy Reading Group. Led by Marko Malink from New York University, around 15 scholars from universities in and around New York City and one from Yale University translated and discussed Book XIX of Aristotle's De Interpretatione.
Lynda Kong, Instructor of English and Writing, signed a contract with Cambridge Scholars Publishers for her reflections to be included as a chapter of their upcoming volume, The Poetry of T. S. Eliot and Religion. In it, she will contemplate Eliot's voice as an appeal to his secular audience, and his influence in her conversion to Christianity during her time at Princeton and Oxford.
Assistant Professor of Biblical and Theological Studies, Dr. Dru Johnson's book Knowledge by Ritual has been published. It is available for purchase on the publisher's website and on Amazon and to read in the school library. From the publisher's website, "Knowledge by Ritual argues that the rites of Israel, as portrayed in the biblical texts, disposed Israelites to recognize something they could not have seen apart from their participation."
Associate Professor of Business, Dawn Fotopulos, was invited to speak at the American Management Association's Breakfast Briefing. She spoke to an audience ranging from aspiring entrepreneurs to senior executives of Fortune 500 companies on "Facing Financial Phobia: Speaking Numbers with Confidence."
In case you missed the buzz on campus or the shares on King's students' social media, Professor Brian Brenberg, Chair of the Program in Business and Finance and Associate Professor of Business and Economics, has made a multitude of appearances on various Fox News outlets, including seven in just this week. He addressed Bernie Sanders' economic policies, particularly Sanders' plans to instate free tuition at pubic colleges and universities. Brenberg argued that, among other unintended consequences, the policy itself would harm the work ethic and promote the already prevalent attitude of entitlement among American students, and that funding the program, even by taxing Wall Street, would ultimately close the middle class's access to the market.
Speaking of the 2016 primary elections, Dr. David Innes, Chair of the Politics, Philosophy & Economics Program, addresses the phenomenon that is, "Bernie Sanders' business class socialists," in an article for World News, explaining that for successful entrepreneurs in a market economy, enabling a welfare state seems to serve as a secular replacement for Christian charity. In another article for World, he responds to Trump's pure business-mindedness, claiming that it is inadequate for running a country, an entity that is indeed far different than a business.
Dr. Joseph Loconte, Associate Professor of History, responded in Providence Journal to the Freedom House report, "Freedom in the World, 2016," concluding that global freedom has been declining every year for the past ten years due in large part to the Obama administration's negligence in upholding human rights and international peace.